Do that which consists in taking no action, and order will prevail.
—Laozi, c. 500 BCQuotes
He may be a patriot for Austria, but the question is whether he is a patriot for me.
—Emperor Francis Joseph, c. 1850The first requirement of a statesman is that he be dull.
—Dean Acheson, 1970In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1830On the loftiest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own rump.
—Michel de Montaigne, 1580The more corrupt the republic, the more numerous the laws.
—Tacitus, c. 117If you must take care that your opinions do not differ in the least from those of the person with whom you are talking, you might just as well be alone.
—Yoshida Kenko, c. 1330The U.S. presidency is a Tudor monarchy plus telephones.
—Anthony Burgess, 1972Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense—nonsense upon stilts.
—Jeremy Bentham, c. 1832A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard.
—Martin Luther King Jr., c. 1967Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made.
—Immanuel Kant, 1784No free man shall be taken or imprisoned or dispossessed or outlawed or exiled, or in any way destroyed, nor will we go upon him, nor will we send against him except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.
—Magna Carta, 1215Every country has the government it deserves.
—Joseph de Maistre, 1811